"Have you reflected on why you would give false evidence to the (medical) tribunal as recently as 2001?" counsel for the commission, Mark Lynch, asked.

"One tries to justify one's conduct; I certainly at the time could not see as clearly as I do today my faults," Mr Edelsten replied.

"I certainly wouldn't do it again and I was foolish to lie the way I did." Mr Edelsten also admitted he had given misleading information in a past attempt to obtain tax relief.

The tribunal was told Mr Edelsten still called himself doctor or professor, claiming the title related to his PhD from a Californian university, which Mr Lynch suggested was not "a bona fide course of study".